In the contemporary business world only thing that
seems to be constant is change and the nature of the competition is such that companies need to leverage on the way they manage
change to gain a competitive advantage. Moreover, the types of changes the companies experience vary in nature as well, for
instance, as industries consolidate, there are increasing number of mergers and acquisitions, the pressures on organisation
to compete in a more global arena are leading to different competitive pressures and more strategic alliances (Papers4you.com,
2006). Furthermore, rapid technological changes are forcing organisations to embrace new technologies and change the way they
work and interface with suppliers and customers (Balogun and Hailey, 2004). However, the phenomenon is not new and has seen
a series of management fads like cultural change programmes, total quality management, business process re-engineering etc.
Unfortunately most of the change programs launched within the organisations are below par, evident in the figure of around
70% failure (Balogun and Hailey, 2004). Hence, strategic change is becoming a highly sought after managerial competence.
Moreover, the change management process is highly
complicated and there is no fixed norm that could be followed. However, like most other areas in management experts have proposed
models for organisational change vis-à-vis Lewin’s model of change, the planning model, the action research model and
the integrative planning model (Harigopal, 2006). These models cover various aspects of the change management process enabling
planned change; however, one facet of the process that has emerged in recent times of increasing globalisation is that of
organisational culture (Papers4you.com, 2006).
The role of cultural awareness has become rather
significant, be it international mergers, acquisitions or just internal business process changes. There has been a barrage
of literature detailing the ways of diagnosing cultural changes and assessing cultural risk in managing change and aligning
strategy and culture with the intended change. Along with managing cultural diversity during change processes, it has become
a standard practice for organisations to publish its core values defining its organisational culture along with its mission
statements on their websites and financial statements.
Be it the construction industry or an Aerospace
organisation strategic change is attracting an increased attention from the management. Especially the extent of involvement
of the people and stakeholders in the process of strategic has been under a constant debate. There are organisations like
the Brazilian Semco, where people decide their own targets and managers their own salaries, which has redefined strategic
change and involvement of people (Crainer, 1999). The bottom line is that strategic management has many facets and is developing
into an area which will receive a lot of management attention.
References
Balogun, J and Hailey. (2004). ‘Exploring Strategic change’. Prentice Hall, London.
Crainer, S. (1999). ‘75 Greatest Management Decisions Ever Made’. Amacom,
NY.
Harigopal, K. (2006). ‘Managing organisational change’. 2nd Ed. Response Books, New Delhi.
Papers For You (2006) "P/B/361. Strategic change
in theory and practice", Available from http://www.coursework4you.co.uk/sprtbus47.htm [22/06/2006]
Papers For You (2006) "P/B/489. Strategic change
at British Aerospace: theory and case study", Available from http://www.coursework4you.co.uk/sprtbus47.htm [21/06/2006]
